The ripping true man who tried to

With the award-winning BBC drama Ripper Street returning to our screens this week, Jessica Yeulett looks at the real-life story of its lead character, Canterbury-born detective Edmund Reid

Born in Canterbury and buried in Herne Bay, the fascinating life of Scotland Yard detective Edmund Reid is bookended by his spells in the district.

But despite being hailed ‘one of the most remarkable men of the century’, he shall forever be remembered as the man who failed to catch Jack the Ripper.

The infamous tale of the hunt for the notorious London murderer returned to our screens this week in the shape of BBC hit drama Ripper Street.

But many do not know the incredible story behind its lead character, played by Matthew Macfadyen.

Edmund John James Reid was born on March 21, 1846, above offices in Beer Cart Lane, Canterbury.

His first spell in the district lasted little time, his parents moving to London when he “was still in long clothes”.

He became a grocer’s delivery boy off the Old Kent Road, later a pastry cook, then a ship’s steward before joining the Metropolitan Police in 1872 at the age of 26.

“I was the shortest man in the force,” recalled Reid in a newspaper profile piece of 1912.

“In fact, the standard was lowered to 5ft 6½in for a fortnight because they wanted men badly – and I could not even reach that.”

Reid rose through the ranks and by 1885 was a detective inspector based at Scotland Yard.

By 1888, when the first of a series of grotesque murders was committed in the Whitechapel area of London, Reid was heading the CID at H Division, with responsibility for that very district.

Over a 10-week period five prostitutes would be killed, all linked definitively to ‘Jack’.

The first victim, Mary Ann Nicholls, was killed on August 31, 1888. Annie Chapman was killed on September 8. Elizabeth Stride and Catherine Eddowes were murdered on September 30 and Mary Jane Kelly on November 9.

The victims’ throats had been cut and at least three had internal organs removed, suggesting the perpetrator was someone of surgical skill.

Reid and his team investigated dozens of butchers, slaughterers, surgeons and physicians because of the manner of the mutilations.

So-called ‘vigilance societies’ formed to try to catch the Ripper, the members of which, according to Reid, “used to black their faces and turn their coats inside out and adopt all sorts of fantastic disguises”.

It was to no avail. Jack the Ripper, who it is thought did not strike again after November 1888, was never caught.

In the 1912 interview, published in Lloyd’s Weekly News, Reid said: “I challenge anyone to produce a tittle of evidence of any kind against anyone. The earth has been raked over and the seas have been swept to find this criminal ‘Jack the Ripper’ – always without success.”

The detective, who did not taste alcohol until he was 36, was not without his own theories, however.

Speaking 25 years after the murders, he said: “My opinion is that the perpetrator of the crimes was a man who was in the habit of using a certain public- Matthew Macfadyen plays Edmund Reid in the BBC drama Ripper Street house, and of remaining there until closing time. He would leave with one of the women.

“My belief is that he would in some dark corner attack her with the knife and cut her up. Having satisfied his maniacal blood-lust he would go away home – and the next day know nothing about it.”

Ill health forced Reid’s retirement from the police in 1896, aged 49, after 23 years’ service. He had received commendation on no fewer than 53 occasions.

Throughout his police career his chief recreation had been ballooning, making 23 ascents from the Crystal Palace and the Alexandra Palace, and winning the gold and bronze medals of the Balloon Society of Great Britain. He was also the first, in 1877, to parachute from 1,000 feet.

Reid returned to east Kent immediately upon leaving the force. He had a short stint as landlord of the Lower Red Lion pub in Herne with his wife Emily Jane, nee Wilson. The couple had a daughter, Elizabeth, born in 1873, and a son, Harold, born in 1882.

In 1903 the newly widowed Reid moved into 4 Eddington Gardens, Hampton-onSea. He was the last man standing when sea erosion forced the abandonment of the row of properties in 1915.

In 1917 he married a second time, in Blean, to Lydia Rhoda Halling who was, at 50, some 20 years his junior. He died aged 71 in December that same year.

Reid is buried at Herne Bay Cemetery. Today his grave is unmarked.

Edmund Reid pictured towards the end of the 19th century